


I've felt the fire, I've held the sword.

by BardicBeatdown



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Beau isn't great with words but shes trying damn it, Beauyasha if you want, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Mild Gore, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-23
Updated: 2020-04-23
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:00:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23802739
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BardicBeatdown/pseuds/BardicBeatdown
Summary: Yasha hasn't been the same since the battle at the cathedral. Beau tries to help.
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett/Yasha
Comments: 4
Kudos: 87





	I've felt the fire, I've held the sword.

**Author's Note:**

> Listen, sometimes you just wanna write some good old fashion angst. Don't @ me. My apologies if it's messy. I've been using the M9 to try and find my feet writing-wise. Title is from It Knows Me by Avi Kaplan

“Hey...Yasha. You alright?”

Beau plants her staff in the ground, abandoning her defensive stance.  
They were sparring, or they were supposed to be. 

An invite from Beau for some one on one defense practice had landed them on the least crowded beach they could find. 

Yasha’s first few strikes were easily avoidable, though Beau just chalked it up to classic Monk Shit. Maybe she was just really on top of her game. 

Then the next one went way wide, and the one after that, and the one after that.  
Yasha was pulling her punches.  
Just like in every other sparring match they’d had since they’d made it back to the coast.

Yasha gives her head a small shake as if waking from a light sleep 

“Of course. The uh…the, glare… of the sun on the sand is making it difficult to-”

“I’m not made of glass, Yasha. I won’t break if you touch me, I promise. You aren’t going to hurt me.”

Yasha gives a small laugh, it’s forced. Her eyes drop to the sand. 

“I've seen you in battle, Beau. I know you’re more than capable of holding your own.”

“Then why are you doing this?”

Yasha shifts her weight uncomfortably, “Doing what?”

“This.” Beau stamps her staff into the ground for emphasis. “Pulling punches, letting me win, walking on eggshells every time I’m around you.”

There’s a flash in Yasha’s mind as Beaus staff sinks into the mound of sand at their feet. Images that seem to replay themselves over and over.

For a split second the mound of sand becomes a bloody Beau.  
The Staff seems to shift into SkinGorger.  
Yasha tries to stifle the wave of nausea that runs through her. 

“I... I told you, it’s just the glare-”

“Bullshit!” Beau’s outburst makes both of them jump.  
“I’m sorry, that was uncalled for. I just…I’ve spent too much of my fucking life being patronized by people who think they know what’s best for me, who think I can’t take care of myself. Now one of the only people on this plane I can trust not to do that is pulling out the kid gloves and won’t tell me why. Talk to me, Yasha. Please.” 

Yasha’s form, as big as it is, seems to shrink slightly as she crosses her arms. She turns completely away from Beauregard facing the water instead. 

There’s a tense silence, broken only but the sound of the waves gently lapping at the shore. Every second seems to be longer than the last. Beau breaks it first. 

“This is about the Cathedral, isn’t it? When I got hurt?”

“Beau, I was the one that hurt you. I almost killed you.”

“You’re wrong.”

Yasha throws her hands up in exasperation “So, you didn’t almost bleed out in front of me? I didn’t watch you pass out after I put a sword through your fucking body?!” She whirls, eyes full of fire. They finally meet Beau’s. She squares up to Beau in an instant, towering over the monk “You almost died and it was my fault, don’t you understand?!”

Beau recoils at first. She was used to being yelled at, sure. Kind of came with the territory of being a hotheaded kid. It’s Yasha raising her voice outside of battle that momentarily shakes her. 

Yasha’s eyes soften even as her body language doesn’t. She tries to keep up her ferocity but her voice has lost its edge.  
“Why do you even want me around? Waiting until I finally finish the job?” She doesn’t mean it; they both know it. Her attempt at intimidation is a poor one.

Beau’s surprise is pulled away by pity and then a wave of anger.

Every muscle in Beaus body tenses, her face screws up in anger. Of course, she fucking understood! She understood it better than anyone else, it was Yasha who didn’t! She wants nothing more to scream her response, to yell and wail the truth until Yasha finally gets it. 

She doesn’t. 

Instead she takes a deep breath, inhaling warm sea air. When she exhales, as the air leaves her, her anger follows.  
Her body relaxes and her expression melts from rage to focus.

Beau’s voice comes out level, gentle almost. “I want you around because you’re my friend and I care about you. You didn’t do anything-”

“I attacked you all! I murdered-”

“Listen to me. You didn’t do anything. It was your sword, it was your body, it wasn’t you.”

Yasha’s hands ball into fists by her side, her expression more frustration than anger. 

“Oban is the one with blood on his hands. He’s the one who hurt me, and he couldn’t even do that right. Look.”

Beau staff falls to the sand as she reaches out to take one of Yasha’s hands, another action that surprises both women.  
She gently unfurls Yasha’s fist before guiding the now open palm to her torso.

The wound Skin Gorger had inflicted was long since healed, half the scar hidden by Beaus cropped shirt, the other half exposed, stopping midway down her stomach. 

“I’m fine. All better, Caduceus made sure of it.”

Beaus skin is warm to the touch and Yasha can feel the slow rise and fall of her breathing. 

The scar is slightly elevated compared to the skin around it and Yasha runs the pads of her fingers over it tentatively as if too much pressure could reopen it. 

Her vision blurs as she tries to blink back tears that pool suddenly. A few fall anyway, despite her attempts to hold them back.

“How can you forgive me so easily?” 

Beau gives the hand in her grasp a light squeeze. “I never blamed you.”

Beau’s words send a pang through Yasha's chest. A relief and a blow combined. 

Her friends forgave her-

(Why should they? She didn’t deserve it. All she does is hurt-)

-thank the gods.

Beau forgave her-

(Beau has every right to kill her. Deserves the chance to-)

Why couldn’t she forgive herself?

When Yasha’s tears begin to fall freely and her breaths turn to sobs, Beau doesn’t know what to say. So she doesn’t say anything. 

She acts on her instinct, thinking back to what her friends, mostly Jester, have done for her at her lowest countless times since they’d met. 

She drops Yasha’s hand, and wraps both arms around the taller woman. 

Yasha’s hands go to her face instead of around Beau but her usual stiffness when embraced is absent. 

Neither of them knows how long they stay like this. 

Frankly Beau doesn’t care, she holds tight, ear to Yasha’s chest. She can hear the barbarian’s heartbeat, tries to will it to slow to match her own. She’ll stand on this beach with Yasha for eons if she has to. Anything to ease even just a fraction of her burdens. 

Eventually, Yasha’s breathing slows. The sobs are fewer and further between though tears still fall silently. 

Then the post-cry exhaustion hits, the energy seems to seep from Yasha’s body in a single wave. Beau feels the shift and begins to draw back but stops as Yasha finally returns her embrace.

“Thank you, Beau.” Her voice is quiet, sheepish almost.

“Anytime.”

They release each other, both unsure what to do with themselves in the moments after. 

Beau, again, is the first to break the silence. “Hey, listen. I know it can’t be easy, what you went through…and I know I can’t say a magic word and fix it but…” She sighs, “I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m here-we’re here…The nein, you know. So, whatever we can do, anything, just let us know. Promise?”

Yasha nods.

“Uh-uh, verbal conformation only. This is a sacred oath.” Beau, says giving her a light punch on the arm. 

Yasha looks down at her, cracking a small smile, “Sacred, huh? Alright, I promise.” She runs a hand through own her hair, “Who gave Beauregard Lionett the authority to decide something’s sanctity? Gods save them.”

Yasha’s grin is contagious and Beau cracks one of her own as she retrieves her staff from the sand.“The Cobalt soul, maybe you’ve heard of it. Come on, Expositor Beauregard is gonna buy you a meal and some ale.” 

“Are those sacred also or just regular?”

“Better watch it before you get my sacred foot up your sacred ass. Wait, that came out wrong.”

She waves it off, starting for the street before Yasha can roast her again.

Yasha follows, hopeful not just that she can overcome this but that she will. The weight in her chest seems lighter for the first time in ages.


End file.
